The carmaker, which has committed to becoming carbon neutral by 2050, said on Wednesday it had entered a strategic partnership with EIT InnoEnergy and will become a shareholder in the EU-backed venture.
The move is in line with other steps by Volkswagen, which in September unveiled plans to set up its own 300 million euro ($348 million) venture capital fund to invest in decarbonisation projects and start-ups in the field.
“The idea is simply … to use InnoEnergy as an additional way to find interesting enterprises and support them in scaling up their business models,” said Jens Wiese, Volkswagen’s head of group M&A, investment advisory and partnerships.